The Mountain
Think of retirement like climbing a mountain.
For 40 years you climbed. You saved, you invested, you kept going up. The day you retire, you reach the top.
Now you have to come down.
Ask anyone who has climbed a real mountain. Coming down is the dangerous part. That is when people get hurt. You are tired, the footing is bad, and one wrong step matters more than it used to.
Nobody climbs down alone if they can help it. They hire a guide who knows the route.
That is our job.
What We Actually Do
Build your paycheck
We figure out how much you can safely take out each month. Then we set up where it comes from and when.
Decide which account to spend first
Most people have three buckets. A regular brokerage account, a traditional IRA or 401(k), and maybe a Roth. The order you spend them in can change your lifetime tax bill by a lot. This is one of the biggest levers you have and most people never touch it.
WHERE YOUR MONEY SITS
Brokerage
Regular account
Taxed as you go
IRA or 401(k)
Traditional
Taxed when it comes out
Roth
If you have one
Not taxed when it comes out
Each bucket is taxed differently.
So the order you spend them in changes what you owe.
There is no single right order. It depends on your income, your brackets, your Medicare premiums and how long the money has to last. Working that out is the job.
Time your Social Security
Claiming at 62, at your full retirement age, or at 70 leads to very different lifetime totals. It also affects your spouse after you are gone. We run the numbers on your actual situation instead of using a rule of thumb.
Handle your required withdrawals
Once you hit the age the IRS sets, you have to start pulling money out of your retirement accounts whether you need it or not. Miss one and the penalty is steep. We track them and plan around them.
Stress test the plan
What if the market drops the year you retire? What if you live to 98? What if one of you passes early and the other loses a Social Security check? We check the plan against bad outcomes, not just average ones.
One Plan, Tested Three Ways
A plan that only works in an average year is not much of a plan.
We do not assume these away. We run each one and see what the plan does. If something breaks, better to find it now, while there is still time to change it.
Who This Is For
You are within five years of retiring, or you already retired. You have savings in retirement accounts. You want to know, with real numbers, whether you are going to be okay.
